New art show shines

Sunshine and flowers outside complemented glass art and watercolors inside during last weekend’s first Art in the Gorge show at Columbia Gorge Hotel.

“It has been fabulous,” White Salmon glass artist Linda Steider said of the 12-artist show, organized by Hood River glass artist Charlene Fort in the hotel’s main dining room.

“The artists are a cohesive group, we all get along well, and we had a fantastic time this weekend,” said Steider, who sold plates, jewelry and photographic art cards.

“I think we’re all quite thrilled with the whole event,” Fort said. “Saturday, the opening day, was a wonderful turnout for customers.

Fort said the committee had first considered scheduling the show last fall but since the Chamber of Commerce expanded Blossom Festival to three weeks the middle weekend made it “the ideal time” to have the show.

“It was right after the Gorge Artists Open Studio tour, so it was a very easy to ask the artists,” Fort said.

Steider said “the work flows together; coincidentally we all work well together in deciding who goes where, how the work looks together, a painter next to a jeweler next to a glass artist, next to another painter, next to an enamellist, and the room just kind of flows.”

“I think every single vendor has had sales, so that’s a plus, that’s a real plus,” Fort said, adding that Hotel Manager Paul Robinson “has gone out of his way to make us feel at home. It’s a very lovely place for the show.”

Glass bead artist Carolyn Crystal of Hood River said, “I like it that the hotel is interested in local artists, and are actually interested in acquiring art for the hotel, too; so if you come here from out of town you see a lot more about the area than just a room. I hope it will have a lot of opportunity for the hotel to help us and vice versa.”